God works in mysterious ways that only He understands and ways we can only hope He reveals to us down the road.
I just returned from the best week of my life in which God completely destroyed me. He broke down thick walls I had built up and tore away bitterness and fear that had been settling in my heart.
A week that was full of God’s beauty and pure love.
This week can only be described by the phrase Basically Amazing. And I know now that these are the only words that will be able to describe my 9 months away as God changes lives through me.
God used this week to help me see how broken I truly was. He used it to soften my heart, change it, and now is using me to do his will. I became his beloved daughter and servant. A title I have feared and was unwilling to accept.
He reminded me that he still heals today and showed me the power of prayer that I had unfortunately been neglecting for some time now.
My experience was Basically Amazing.
This was the first time I was meeting my squad mates in person. I was nervous to say the least. How would they see me? Would they accept me and my past?
My body was physically present, my feet were taking me further, my mind was ready to start conversation and was thinking of things I could say to make these strangers love me. But my heart was closed, retreating, and not ready to expose itself to these people.
God quickly went to work to rip these walls away.
How can I explain in one blog how He irreversibly changed my life and the way I see His world? I can’t, please join with me in reading this two-part blog about how Christ broke down my worldly identity and built me up in Him in just one week.
I had never been so close to something so beautiful. This waterfall was shining with God’s beauty. And He was allowing his children to play in it, to rejoice in it, and to laugh while being immersed in His creation.
On just the second day of camp I was feeling out of place. I was watching my teammates worship and I felt like I didn’t belong. It felt fake to open my mouth to sing along, I felt like a fraud to lift my hands because I wasn’t feeling the Holy Spirit. Oh I could see it, I could see it manifested deep inside the people around me, but I didn’t personally feel it in my heart. These walls were still up. So I worshiped silently, without opening my mouth or raising my hands. I worshiped through tears, I wept every time I worshiped.
I hadn’t cried in a long time. This year had tested my faith to every extreme and instead of rising up with God by my side and running head first into the fire I retreated, and I doubted his plans for me. This drove a wedge in our relationship and kept me from feeling emotions that would pierce my heart. I allowed myself to close off my heart and build up walls. Until He decided that wasn’t good enough.
Monday night:
I decided to sit behind the curtain during worship, out of sight. Earlier in the evening one of my squad trainers had challenged me to ask God who I was. A question that has been on my heart for a very long time, an unanswered question that has caused a lot of problems in my day to day life.
As I sat by listening to everyone worship the director of training camp came to me and sat down. He simply laid his hands on me as I was praying, and finally he spoke.
“Rachel, I feel as though you’re sitting here looking around and you see everyone who has this great connection and relationship with God and you desire that. You want that too.”
As he spoke these words of truth to me, I began to weep. He was spot on. He saw right into my heart, or at least God was using him to do so.
Worship came to an end, so I made my way in front of the curtain but decided to stay towards the back. This is where it gets really good. This is when God really let my heart have it.
As Ron preached about Holy Spirit a fire was planted in my heart. One that I didn’t fully understand and one I was still not willing to accept. As his message came to an end he asked us all to stand because he was going to invite the Holy Spirit into the chapel. He asked staff to move around the room and lay hands on us and pray.
I stood in the back alone, with hands clenched, and hoped that no one would really notice me. I simply wanted to observe in the shadows, I wanted my heart to stay closed. But God had other plans.
All at once the room erupted. People began worshiping in all different ways. On the left of me a woman fell to the floor with intense laughter, and on the right a man began speaking in tongues. Various people had their hands lifted, some had fallen to their knees, some remained seated with heads bowed. Then towards the front, blood-curdling screams came ripping from this woman. Fear erupted inside my body and left me frozen.
Ron prayed that we not be distracted by this and admitted that there was spiritual warfare pouring out in the room. I remained fearful as I watched a group of staff move the girl into another room as Satan continued to attack her.
As I looked around the room wide-eyed I spotted a staff member standing at the front of the room. He simply had his hand over his heart and his other arm outstretched pointing at different people, saying a word over them and then would point to someone else. As I watched him do this he pointed at me, we locked eyes, and I fell to the floor.
I fell down in between the seats and instantly began weeping. Fear was still rushing through my veins. Then I experience spiritual warfare like never before. On my right I heard a deep growling and on the left a sweet loving voice. I went towards the voice to my left and begged it to take the growling and the fear away. I didn’t want to feel helpless anymore.
I decided to crawl out into the aisle and get away from that spot.
But God wasn’t done with me yet.
As I buried my head in my arms I began to cry. Not a quiet outpour of tears, but I deep and loud sob that filled the chapel. I was grieving all the things I had pushed so desperately away not to feel. I felt hands on my back and head, although I didn’t hear what the woman was praying, I cried harder until it instantly stopped, and peace rushed through me.
I couldn’t stop there, I wanted more, the fire in my heart was burning deeper and this time I wanted to accept it, I wanted to feel.
I prayed that God would let me feel again, that emotions would be something I could once again experience, that he would soften my heart.
And he did just that. I was overwhelmed with every emotion possible. I felt grief, anger, happiness, sorrow, hurt, acceptance, rejection, the list goes on. And as I felt all of these things I asked the Lord to take it, and he simply did.
Overcome with the purest love.
Basically Amazing.
The fear that had previously been flowing through me was replaced with deep, rich love.
I began to laugh. It started as a small giggle but soon built into an outburst of joy.
I wept and laughed on my knees with my hands open, head back, letting Him pour into me. A woman knelt before me and spoke, “Rachel I feel like you’re so full of joy because you see the Father standing in front of you, jumping for joy that his daughter is back.” I laughed harder. Yes Lord, yes!
Even when worship was over I couldn’t stop. As my teammates embraced me and saw my happiness they hugged me harder. All I felt was love and acceptance.
Basically Amazing.
God saw my brokenness and didn’t allow me to hide from it.
Instead he placed a fire in my heart and a boldness to grab his hand and run straight into the flames.
When the enemy attacks it is so easy for us to fear and doubt in the plans God has for us. But fear is from hell. Whom shall I fear if God is for me? Who will stand against me?
We should rise up, slay our trials. We can’t look at yesterday and allow it to say who we are today. For a long time I allowed my past to define who I was instead of letting the Wonderful Creator define my identity.
On just the second day, God planted a fire within me and changed me completely and I let him.
